


i've got a fascination with your presentation

by askmeaboutmyoctopustheory



Category: Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Retail, Awkward Conversations, Baristas are All-Knowing, Her hair is full of secrets, Hijinks & Shenanigans, M/M, Misunderstandings, Natasha Romanov Knows All, Punk Clint Barton, Shopping Malls, Soft Bucky Barnes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-13
Updated: 2020-04-13
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:13:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23625190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/askmeaboutmyoctopustheory/pseuds/askmeaboutmyoctopustheory
Summary: “This guy… he was all…” Clint waved his hands around again, hoping Natasha would understand. “He had a unicorn phone case? And glitter nail polish?”“Oh, you mean Bucky.”“Yeah!”Natasha gave him another appraising look. “He works at Claire’s.”“That explains the…”“Yeah, he thinks it’s cute.”-----orthe Claire's/Hot Topic worker AU that someone not only asked for but explicitly requested
Relationships: Clint Barton & Kate Bishop, Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov, James "Bucky" Barnes & Tony Stark, James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton
Comments: 31
Kudos: 164





	i've got a fascination with your presentation

**Author's Note:**

  * For [estranqer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/estranqer/gifts).



> hello all! 
> 
> so i'm pretty sure i saw this idea first on like the RandomAUGenerator twitter feed but somehow i was talking to it and then i was lucky enough to get commissioned to write it!
> 
> title is from "crush" by tessa violet

The first time Clint crossed paths with the Claire’s guy was in the elevator before a shift. They were both going through the bowels of the mall towards the floor and the guy’s phone rang. After the first bars of a One Direction song, he fished his phone out of his pocket and answered it, shooting Clint a dirty look.

“Yeah, I’m on my way. You- Yeah fine I’ll stop and get coffee.” 

Clint barely heard the half of the conversation that he was exposed to because he was still processing the odd picture that the other man painted. He had on a pale blue henley shirt and jeans that clung to his thighs. His hair was half pulled up like Pebbles Flintstone in a neon pink cheetah print scrunchie and he had dangly plastic earrings in both his lobe piercings. When he hung up his phone, Clint realized his phone case was a glittery purple unicorn. The least odd thing was that he had a fancy metal prosthetic coming out of his left sleeve. When he glared, Clint realized he had been staring.

“You got a problem?”

Clint blinked and startled slightly. “N-No! You’re just…” He waved his hand up and down. “You’ve got an interesting look goin’.”   
  
The guy just snorted. “You’re hardly one to talk.” 

He pulled a hand-decorated name tag out of a tiny backpack dwarfed on his broad shoulders. It just read “Bucky”   
  
Bucky, if that was his name, had a point. Clint hadn’t spiked his mohawk up today but his shaved sides exposed the piercings that crawled up and into his ears. His jeans were shredded and his tattoos visible under his Nirvana shirt. He scratched his neck awkwardly. The silence was mercifully ended by the ding of the elevator.

“Well, see ya around?”

  
They went opposite ways at the end of the short hallway and Clint just blinked to adjust to the horrible mall lighting. He stumbled into the starbucks right in front of him and saw his best friend, Natasha, ready at the counter with his drink.

“You’re late.”   
  
“I think I just met a fairy in the elevator.”

Nat’s eyebrows raised under her uniform baseball cap.

“This guy… he was all…” Clint waved his hands around again, hoping Natasha would understand. “He had a unicorn phone case? And glitter nail polish?”   
  
“Oh, you mean Bucky.”

“Yeah!” 

Natasha gave him another appraising look. “He works at Claire’s.”   
  
“That explains the…”   
  
“Yeah, he thinks it’s cute.”   
  
“He is.” Clint said absently. “I mean! Wait-”

Nat just cackled and shooed him away. “Go be a gay disaster elsewhere, I want to drink as much of my own coffee as I can before the mall opens.”

Clint saluted her with his coffee and wandered out towards his own store. His other closest friend Kate was opening with him. She was playing a heavy metal cover of Toxic by Britney Spears as she counted the till. 

“‘Sup loser?” She nodded in greeting.

“The usual” Clint replied, kicking her gently with his thickly treaded boots. “Got you coffee.”

“My hero.” 

They went about the opening tasks in comfortable silence, just the sound of the heavy metal covers playing and the clinking of coins as Kate counted them. Their coworker for the morning shift showed up and kissed his boyfriend goodbye.

“Ugh Billy. You and your wholesome perfect relationship.” Kate scowled.

“Being in love is punk rock as hell.” He responded with a middle finger towards her.

“Hey now, don’t make me write you up for workplace tensions.” Clint said half-heartedly. 

“She’s just annoyed because she can’t woman up and ask that girl from Foot Locker out.”

“Shut up.” Kate shot back at him.   
  
Clint sighed and rubbed at his temple. “I met the hottest guy I’ve ever seen this morning.”

Both Billy and Kate fell silent and looked at him. Clint grinned and walked over to busy himself with straightening a display. 

“You can’t say that and then walk off!” Kate protested.

“I just did.” Clint knew they were all being a bit brisly this morning, maybe he needed to go for another coffee run. “And I don’t know much about him, just ran into him in the elevator.”

“Ok, well what made him so hot?” Billy pushed. 

“He’s built like a fuckin mack truck.” Clint said absently, remembering the pastel shirt stretched across the wide shoulders. “Long-ish hair. Jawline that could cut diamonds. Need more?”   
  


“I mean, yeah.” Kate leaned over the counter on her elbows with an expectant face.

“He was wearing like glittery stuff, nail polish and that sorta thing. Earrings and cutesy stuff. I think he works at Claire’s. All fluffy and pastel.”   
  
As his voice trailed off they all heard the pointed sound of someone clearing their throat on the other side of the grating that kept the shop closed to the public until open. Clint whirled around to see Bucky standing there, clearly having overheard everything Clint had just said about him.

“You dropped your nametag at starbucks…” Bucky said in a clipped voice, looping Clint’s lanyard through the grating. 

“Wait!” 

Clint’s long legs got him to the grating in only a few steps but Bucky was already striding off with his shoulders hunched. Clint rattled at the bars of the cage like an animal and swore. 

“I take it that was him?” Kate said, poking her head through the grating and unlocking the cage.

“Dammit.” Clint scowled. “Yeah. It was.”   
  
“You’re right, he’s hot.” Billy said from where he was perched on the register counter painting his nails. “Too bad he probably thought you were making fun of him.”

“Shut it, Kaplan. You’re gonna arrange the new t-shirt display just for that.” Clint lifted his coffee to his mouth and realized his cup was empty. Seemed like the morning was just out for him.

↹ ↹

Bucky felt his anger bubbling up as he walked away from the Hot Topic. Natasha had found Clint’s nametag at her starbucks and had told Bucky to go deliver it to him with that knowing glance. 

Baristas know everything, all the gossip. But she must have misunderstood. Clint’s laugh still echoed in Bucky’s ears. 

He knew he drew some glances. He had long since passed the body type of the typical “softboy” and his resting scowl and prosthetic tended to make people see him as a hardass. Except his little nieces, who liked sticking magnets to his metal arm and braiding his hair. After the fourth trip with them at the mall, he applied to work at their favorite store and that was that. Something about talking to little kids about unicorns and one direction was the farthest cry from his army days. It was exactly what he had needed.

“Who pissed in your fruit loops this mornin, Buck?” the cheerful voice of his coworker Nadia asked.

“Just had a run-in with an idiot who works upstairs.” He grumbled. 

“You might have to be more specific, there are a lot of idiots.” She replied distractedly.

“This hot punk lookin dude who works at Hot Topic.” Bucky told her as he put his backpack behind the cash register and dabbed some body glitter onto his face. “Luckily he was an asshole to me before I could consider catching The Feelings for him.”

“Mmm” Nadia just shook her head at him with a grin. “We’ve got a small party coming in this afternoon. Just the usual stuff, around 10 kids.”   
  
“Anyone else coming in today?” Bucky asked as he wandered around straightening.

“Yeah, Gwen comes in at noon.” She tossed the store keys at him from behind the counter for him to unlock the grates. “And you forgot to bring me coffee.”

“You go and get some, I can finish opening.” Bucky tossed her his phone. “Use my starbucks card since I forgot.”

Mornings at Claire’s were not particularly busy due to the majority of their target demographic bieng in some type of school. They used the time to restock or catch up with messages from corporate. 

“You gotta head to Stark soon?” Nadia asked Bucky once they had both gone over the inventory sheets.

Bucky glanced up at the clock. “Oh shit. I mean-” He grimaced apologetically at the one mom that was in the store. “Yeah, it’ll only be a second.”   
  
“I know. I can manage.” She pushed him a bit

Bucky gave her a mock salute and went down the hall a bit to the Stark Industries store. Howard Stark was best known for weapons and machinery, but his son Tony was interested in a wider range of things. The brick and mortar store in the mall sold some of the gadgets and electronics that Tony was known for. He had also come up with a flexible and lightweight metal to use for prosthetics and Bucky was one of his trial participants. He just had to check in every other week, let Tony poke at his arm with some tool or another, and feign interest in whatever ridiculous story Tony told him.

“You realize there are better ways to get the attention of the security guard than making a scene in your store, right Tones?” Bucky chuckled.

“Yes but those aren’t as fun.” Tony jabbed Bucky’s side with his little probe in retort. “And besides, we talk outside of our… altercations when I have to throw somebody out.”

“Good for you, Stark.” Bucky hopped off the makeshift workbench that Tony had in the back of the store

“You got any lucky fellas, Barnes? Or-” He gave Bucky a look. “Unlucky?”   
  
Bucky felt his lip twitch and Tony narrowed his eyes before he could say anything. “Oh?”   
  
“God, Tony- no.” Bucky rolled his eyes. “It’s nothing.”   
  
“Alright, keep telling yourself that. But that kicked puppy look only comes when you meet a guy and then convince yourself that he doesn't like you.” Tony shooed him from the shop without another word. 

Bucky felt himself stewing in his annoyance and glanced at his watch. He was due to take his lunch and there was another coworker coming in soon so Nadia wouldn’t be alone. Bucky shot her a quick text and rerouted himself to the food court. It seemed as though it  _ was _ his unlucky day, because his eyes immediately flickered to a middle table where Clint was sitting with one of his leather-clad coworkers. It looked like they had the entire sbarro menu on the table in front of them and Bucky decided that he really only needed a smoothie for lunch today.

“Oh no, Bucky’s got his grumpy face on.” His coworker Gwen said in a singsong voice when Bucky returned to the store. 

“He’s being broody because of a boy.” Nadia said, shooting a conspiratorial wink at a little girl trying on a red headband. She turned back to Gwen with a grin. “The one with the mohawk at Hot Topic that isn’t  _ your _ boyfriend.”

“When is that birthday party?” Bucky said loudly and pointedly, shooting his customer service smile at the single dad that was wandering with his kids.

The party host arrived just a moment later and Bucky’s roller coaster of a morning exited his mind in favor of discussing logistics with the harried-looking mom. The partygoers as usual were overjoyed to stick magnets and stickers onto Bucky’s metal prosthetic and put some of the ridiculous accessories into his hair. He was grinning widely by the time he punched his time card and left the clean up to Gwen and the closer. Bucky ran into Natasha as she was waiting for the employee elevator and suddenly remembered his elevator interaction that morning.

“Busy day?” She asked with a glance at the emoji magnets on his arm and sparkly barrettes in his hair.

“Just the usual.” Bucky reached up and let his hair out of the scrunchie. 

“How’d-uh…” Natasha floundered for a moment. “Did you give Clint his nametag?”   
  
Bucky felt his mouth twitch. “Yeah. I did.”   
  
“Oh god.” She looked over his face searchingly. “What did he do?”   
  
“How do you know he did something?”   
  
“Because he’s an idiot and you’re in a very different mood than you were this morning when I told you where he worked.”

Bucky pressed his lips together thinly, debating whether to let Natasha know what had gone on. On one hand, she was a mutual friend of both him and Clint. On the other, it was just a throw away interaction in the elevator. It didn’t mean anything. Why was it bothering him so much?

“He just… He was talkin’ about me to his coworkers when I went to drop it off and… it wasn’t real flattering.” Bucky let his voice trail off. “It’s fine. Nat, I’m used to assholes thinking less of me because of the way I like to dress or because I’m missing ¼ of my limbs.”

“I don’t-” Nat cut herself off and frowned. “I really think there might have been a misunderstanding. Clint’s not the kinda guy to judge someone for what they put on their body or what’s different about them.”

Bucky just shrugged.

“Ask him about his pizza tattoo next time you see him. It’s funny.”

“His- What?” Bucky asked but Natasha had strode out of the elevator and he was left in the empty box. 

↹ ↹

Clint flopped over and over in his bed the next morning, not wanting to go into work. Nat had called him the night before and told him he was an idiot and may have threatened bodily harm but he wasn’t quite sure. The hot guy from the elevator-whose name was actually Bucky- had thought that Clint was mocking him and now there was a big complicated mess of a misunderstanding. Because baristas knew everyone’s business, Natasha had been the unlucky middleman. 

Fortunately, Clint only had to suffer through a half day today. And as luck would have it he ran into Bucky much like he had done the day prior. The shorter man was waiting for the elevator in the employee hallway wearing a rainbow checked shirt and typing away at his phone. His hair was in a sequin scrunchie today. 

“Hey.” Clint started awkwardly. 

Bucky looked up, startled and suddenly looked like a pinned animal. 

“Hey, sorry. Didn’t mean to sneak up on you.” Clint stepped back and saw Bucky relax minutely. “I also uh- think we got off on the wrong foot?”

Bucky snorted out a laugh. “I’ve been instructed to not take it to heart.”   
  
“Oh you know Nat, then.”

Bucky grinned at that and Clint thought to himself that he would do anything to keep that expression on the other man’s face. 

“I sure do. She told me to ask you about your pizza tattoo?” Bucky tilted his head to the side a little, making the body glitter dabbed onto his face shine under the bad lighting. 

Clint just grinned a huge grin and lifted up his Sex Pistols shirt. His lower abdomen was covered in a semi-realistic pepperoni pizza tattoo. It was designed to look like the pizza was sticking out of his skinny jeans that were just a little too short on his long legs. The best part of the objectively ridiculous tattoo, however, was the curlicue writing arching over the top saying “All you can eat”.

And looking at Clint’s abs, Bucky was  _ very _ interested in the buffet.

“That’s um…” Bucky’s mouth was dry. He was spared from his quickly dirtying thoughts by the ding of the elevator. “You gettin coffee?”

“God yes.” Clint groaned. “Honestly I’m surprised that I’ve been able to carry a conversation this long without caffeine.”

Bucky laughed softly. “Well can you let me treat you? As a sort of do-over for jumping to conclusions yesterday?”

“I’m not gonna say no.” Clint grinned at him again and skillfully avoided Natasha’s withering gaze as they waited for their drinks. “But I am gonna ask if you’d want to get, uh- Dinner? Or something?”   
  
Bucky handed him his cold brew with a wink. “I think I can manage that.”

**Author's Note:**

> find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/_AMAMOT) or i’m on [tumblr](https://askmeaboutmyoctopustheory.tumblr.com/)
> 
> there are a few easter eggs/open ended things in here and i'd love to chat in the comments or on socials :*


End file.
